Hetty's Radar
by TheVirtuoso
Summary: Deeks wasn't expecting this when he went to work that day (Pre-series, post Legends NCIS)


"Don't let anyone but me in that room, Y'hear?" Jamie emphasized his command with sharp hand motions and a poke to Deeks' chest. Deeks nodded to his boss and positioned himself to guard the captive.

Deeks watched the man tied to the chair from his vantage point by the open door. The man's legs were tied to the chair legs, his hands similarly secured behind the chair-back. Blood ran sluggishly from a bullet wound in his right thigh. His left eye looked painful to Deeks: it was purpled and swelling shut. The guy must have been a fed. Deeks couldn't think of any other reason for the drug runner _du jour_ to keep him alive.

Three weeks ago Deeks managed to form connections in on of the Cartel's satellite distributor's organizations. It was supposed to be a first step to taking down the cartel but, if this guy was a fed, Deeks foresaw a quick extraction before the day was out. With any luck this bozo hadn't screwed up so royally that Deeks would still be able to take down Jamie.

Deeks sighed and stepped into the room. He snapped the door behind him. The fed jumped. Deeks scowled at the man.

"So, rookie, what part of the alphabet are you from?" Deeks asked. He must be a rookie, the man was too young to be anything else.

"My- my name's Ryan?"

"Are you asking me or telling me?" Deeks smiled coolly. He wanted to strangle the man. And the person who put him under with Jamie. "Just how green are you? You do know what the alphabet is don't you? Me, I'm a LEO, well not really, I 'm a Capricorn but that's not important right now."

Ryan just blinked in confusion. Maybe whatever hit Ryan's face gave him a concussion. There was movement on the other side of the door. Deeks heard the handle rattle. He raised his hand and smacked Ryan's left cheek. The fed's head snapped right.

"What are you doing in here Dimitri?" Deeks snapped at the man who poked his head in.

"Just checking up." Dimitri answered. His weak voice caught in his throat, "What are you doing man?"

"The boss wants me to talk to our new playmate. Charley-boy here doesn't want to play though." Deeks said the first name that came to his mind. "Now get out." Dimitri disappeared. Deeks refocused on Ryan. The poor man's eyes were wide and scared (and an odd shade of brown that had far too much blue to truly be brown).

"Sorry about that Ryan." Deeks tried to reassure but he was still too pissed about the whole situation to make it sound sincere, "That was Dimitri. He takes care of Jamie's books and is far too curious for his own good. He's going to get people killed one day.

"Now where were we?" Deeks examined his nails, "Look kid I can get you out of here but I need you to do something for me."

"Like I'd ever do anything for you, drug-dealing scum." Ryan croaked. He leaned as far over as his restraints would let him and spat out a mouth full of blood.

"What?" Deeks squinted "We've.. Didn't we.. Are you really that green? I'm a LEO." Deeks paced in the tiny room for a few steps before giving an exasperated growl.

"I don't care if your birthday's in summer. I ain't doing anything for you." Ryan reiterated.

"Not Leo the lion, LEO: it's an acronym. Law Enforcement Officer. I'm undercover and I have been for a while. Congratulations Ryan, you probably just ruined an op that's been months in the making." Deeks rubbed his right hand over his eyes, "Now that we've got that out of the way, as I was saying I can get you out but I need something from you. You being here has Jamie on edge so I can't get word to my partner. So, what I need you to do is tell Detective Williams, I need you to tell her "Marty says Fraggle Rock" can you do this for me Ryan?" Ryan nodded jerkily.

"Yeah I think I can do that. My- my boss probably knows who that is and if she doesn't my team leader must."

"You must be a well connected fed, hu kid." Deeks moved around behind the chair, "Yowch your wrists must be killing you." Deeks had assumed Ryan's arms would be tied like his legs: with tight but forgiving rope instead he was sporting silvery handcuffs tightened far too much to be comfortable. Deeks kept a set of keys in the heal of his shoes under the insole just in case. He fished them out and tried not to smell them as he freed Ryan's hands. The key went back in it's hiding spot while Ryan massaged his wrists.

"Come on man," Deeks said after freeing his legs, "Lets get you back to your well connected boss." Deeks pulled the smaller man up by his shoulder and helped support him. The wound in Ryan's leg gave them pause, Ryan from the pain, Deeks couldn't decide if it would keep the younger man from escaping. Deeks sighed and pulled off his belt.

"This is going to hurt but, thanks to Dimitri, everyone out there will be expecting some screaming so don't hold back." Deeks wrapped the belt around the top of Ryan's leg and pulled it tight. Dimitri screamed at the added pressure.

-/888

Deeks managed to lead them out of the building and into a nearby ally before leaving Ryan on his own, "You remember my message Ryan?"

"Yeah "Marty says Fraggle Rock" and I have to give it to LAPD Detective Williams." Ryan nodded. His face was paper white and covered in a thin sheen of sweet.

"Alright, can you make it out on your own?"

"I think so. My partner should be near by. My coms got knocked out when all this," he gestured to himself, "started."

"Okay, I gotta get back before Dimitri starts sniffing around again." Deeks clapped Ryan's shoulder and headed back to the office building Jamie had claimed as his own. At the door he looked back at Ryan only to see him leaning on a slim woman as they half-jogged toward a silver hatchback. Deeks ducked into the building as the woman moved around the hood to the driver's seat. Deeks was back inside before she pulled away.

Deeks scuffed the drops of blood Ryan left behind with his shoe on his way back to Jamie's favourite holding cell. He took up the guard position outside the empty room. Deeks prayed to a god he didn't really believe in that Ryan kept his promise. If not Deeks was as good as dead as soon as Jamie got back.

Dimitri creeped out of the shadows nearly an hour later. His washed out gray eyes flicked around the hall from his age-wrinkled face.

"What do you want Dimitri?"Deeks drawled.

"Boss wants ya. Said something about an exchange taking place down by the east dry dock." Dimitri refused to look Deeks in the eye. Under normal circumstances Deeks might find that concerning but Dimitri was enough of an oddball that Deeks dismissed it. "What happened to the kid?"

"I hit him too hard. He's taking a nap. Go get Butterball to stand guard for me, I'll wait until you get back." Butterball had a habit of slacking off but his sheer size was enough to give most people pause. Deeks knew the man wouldn't get curious enough to open the door. Dimitri scurried off to find the formidable enforcer.

-/8888

"Ah there you are," Jamie exclaimed. He wrapped a hand around the back of Deeks neck in an intimate pseudo-hug.

Deeks cleared his throat. He'd always been uncomfortable with any level of PDA, Jamie's carer path certainly didn't help matters, "Yeah here I am. What do you need me for?"

"There's a man in town. He's just passing through but," Jamie shrugged, "I'm gunna hook him up with something to pass the time." Translation: a) Jamie's boss wanted the distributor to distribute; or b) Jamie wanted to take out the new competition. Jamie liked to pretend he was the man in charge, that he didn't have cartel overlords.

"Alright boss, Dimitri said something about the dry docks?" It was an unusual location for Jamie. He tended to prefer the factory district to the north for his shady deals. Deeks could only hope that this was a request from higher up the food chain. Deeks was getting sick of taking bad shots at drug runners. Jamie had him on as a shooter. Luckily Deeks had only been required to shoot two people. He winged one but out right missed the other. Deeks would have preferred to take them down but the deaths wouldn't have been justified.

"Yeah. The guy's South African or something. He picked the place." Jamie's hand flapped about as he lead Deeks and a small entourage out to his range rover. Deeks took the front passenger seat, Jamie sat behind him.

-/888

Deeks did his best to school his features into something that could almost be considered threatening. He was two steps behind and to the right of Jamie. The African and his own muscle were waiting when Deeks' party arrived. Not that the man needed much muscle in Deeks' opinion. He was built like a tree. A big tree.

Jamie and his new friend exchanged frosty pleasantries. Deeks kept his face cool and even.

"So, you're new in town, uh?" Jamie said.

"You could say that." the new guy's muscle replied. "My boss," he continued, "isn't a fan of small talk. Or English for that matter."

Deeks smirked and fought back a chuckle. He'd pay money that the boss-man spoke perfect English. Pretending to be less than proficient probably got him a lot of useful information (and it couldn't hurt if he was ever arrested).

"'S that right?" Jamie drawled, "Does he speak any English?"

"Sure, what was that show y'like boss?" The muscle asked his boss. The man had longish brown hair and greenish eyes, maybe, Deeks was a bit too far away to make out eye colour. He said something to his boss in what could have been Farsi. It could have been Sandskrit or Vulcan for all Deeks knew about languages though.

The boss replied in kind. Deeks had no way of knowing what they said but he swore part of it sounded like Fraggle Rock.

"Right that show with the puppets -"

"Fraggle Rock?" Deeks cut in, speaking for the first time.

"Yeah that one. The boss likes it. Now down to business if you please?" Neither man gave Deeks more than a cursory glance. He couldn't tell if this was some elaborate extraction or just a coincidence. He shifted his weight.

"Yes, yes to business." Jamie nodded and motioned Deeks forward. "Show him the goods, this man wants to party." Deeks stepped towards the buyer showing his little silver case to the pair the muscle moved to meet the detective.

In short order Deeks exchanged the drugs for money and suddenly people swarmed the dock. Deeks drew his gun but didn't fire. The muscle grabbed him and pulled him down, "Williams sends her regards, Marty." Deeks relaxed into the man's grip.

-/8888

Deeks watched Jamie's head disappear into the LAPD cruiser ahead of his own. It seems the department underestimated the number of arrests they had to make: they were one car short so Deeks was pared with Muscle (actual name: Renko). The driver greeted Renko like an old friend after the door snapped shut.

"I leave for five months and they rope you in to pull out a detective?" the driver, for all his uniform blues, sounded aghast at the idea of extracting Deeks.

"I know, I was in Hawaii. There are some odd things going on at Pearl."

"What happened anyway? Eric just said you needed another driver."

"Your team's new trainee got himself into a situation. The good detective here was kind enough to help him out."

"Y'know," Deeks drawled from his position behind the driver, "I can hear everything you say. And where are we going? You just missed the turn off to the station." Deeks watched longingly as the cut off that would take him back to PD and a sense of normalcy slipped past. Deeks might not be the best loved cop at the station but it was still something like home.

"Oh we're not cops. But you got Ryan out of a sticky situation so we thought we should return the favour." Renko dismissed Deeks with a flap of his hand.

"Ryan? Who's that?" asked the driver.

"He's the new trainee I mentioned. He must not be doing too well if you haven't met him yet."

"I've been off sick you know that."

"Oh is that what you're calling getting shot almost a half dozen times." Deeks sputtered, chocking on his own spit. The driver made an abortive attempt to laugh but ended up groaning instead.

"Don't make me laugh Renko, you have no idea how painful this is."

The cruiser turned off the parkway near Venice Beach. The driver wove in and out of traffic with practised ease. They moved with just a little more speed then Deeks was comfortable with. Especially knowing his driver had wounds.

"If you're not cops just what are you? Why are you in a cruiser?" Deeks asked. He was more than a little worried. Maybe Ryan didn't know what a LEO because he wasn't a fed. Maybe he was part of some other criminal organization.

"Relax detective," the driver smiled at him through the rear-view mirror, "We just borrowed it from LAPD. They'll have it back in no time at all." The car rolled to a stop outside the docks -wet ones this time- and Renko opened his door. He pulled Marty, still cuffed, out of the back seat. Marty didn't know what to do so he just went with it.

"You are going back to bed as soon as you leave. If you don't I'll have you to blame when your partner murders me." Renko kept a firm hand on Deeks' upper arm while he leaned into the open window of the cruiser.

"Yeah, yeah. I'm pretty beat anyway. This is the longest I've been up in a few months." Deeks heard. He couldn't see the man though. Renko pulled his prisoner toward the end of the dock as the driver pulled away from the curb.

"So what now? A long walk off a short pier?" Deeks quipped. There were only two options: the aforementioned or an old, slightly run down, boat-shed.

Renko laughed easily, hopefully that meant that Deeks would be walking away from this – what ever it was – and not that the man was a cold blooded killer. "Nothing like that Marty. The boss just wants to meet ya."

"You mean that big guy you were with at the exchange isn't the boss?" Deeks was surprised. He really was.

"No that's the team leader. Well. Acting team leader while today's driver is still in recovery." He pushed open the door to the boat-shed with his shoulder and lead Deeks inside.

"Ah, there you are Mr. Renko. I trust you had no trouble getting here." Came a voice from within.

"None at all Hetty." Ranko called out while he unlocked Deeks' cuffs.

"And your driver?"

"Sent him home. You might want to get Eric to make sure he went though. I don't want to be blamed if Sam finds him doing something Callen." Deeks didn't know what 'Doing Something Callen' meant but he bet it wasn't good.

"That is a good idea, Mr. Renko. Now I believe there is a flight booked for you to get back out to Pearl. You best get going."

And suddenly it was just Deeks and Hetty. She was a tiny thing. Probably under five feet tall. Her eyes hid behind wide, thick glasses on a thin gold chain. She wore a professional pantsuit in forest green over an off-white turtle neck. Considering the lack of AC in the shed Deeks was surprised the little woman was not overheating.

"Come, Mr. Deeks, there is no need to stand at attention." She motioned to the low couches in one corner of the room. They were on the other side of a little warn down wooden table with three chairs and a wall mounted TV. The TV had some odd show – a police procedural or something – with a cave-like room of computer screens and people scurrying about. There was no sound. Deeks sunk into the couch closest to the wall.

"So," Deeks said, "You're the boss." It wasn't really a question.

"No, detective, I'm not the boss. I have bosses of my own. I am, however, Mr. Ryan and Mr. Renko's boss.

"Now, as I understand it, you were working your way up Jamie Cruz' organization in the hopes to move your investigation to the Cartel he worked for, correct?" Hetty asked as she stood before the seated detective.

"Uh, yeah." Deeks said. He really hoped she wasn't part of that cartel. Maybe Ryan had been sent to check up on Jamie's operations.

"Right. That is no long an LAPD case. They took something they shouldn't have and got on my bad side." Hetty said, "They made the mistake of thinking they could get away with killing American service men and women. I've had my people speak to your partner and your captain. This is no longer your problem Mr. Deeks."

"What?" Deeks asked, "You can't just take our case. I've been working this for almost a month! And who are you anyway?"

"I can and I did. As to who I am? I am Hetty. Who I am beyond that is far above your pay grade Mr. Deeks. Now, you have some debriefing to do at your station. There is a car outside to take you there."

-/888

Deeks tried to strike up a conversation with the woman who picked him up. He was sat in the back of a silver hatchback. His driver was almost certainly the woman who picked up Ryan but Deeks couldn't get her to talk. He couldn't get anything out of her. He didn't even see her face.

-/888

More than a year passed and Deeks had all but forgotten the oddity that was the Jamie case. He'd had enumerable cases since then. But then the Daniel Zuna had to get himself killed. Deeks had been working fine with the Blood and Guts Warriors – a little hard to crack sure but they were mostly marines so it's not as if a difficult beginning wasn't unexpected.

Tracy seemed odd right from the get go but she somehow won a place in the marine's grieving hearts. Looking back it makes sense. She probably knew all the buttons to push.

It was the driver though, the cabby that really pulled at Deeks' memories. "D'you call for a cab?" He said but the way he smirked seemed so familiar. Deeks wished he had access to arrest records. He knew he'd met the cabby before but he just couldn't place him.

He's ashamed to admit he didn't recognize Williams at all. Deeks blamed the accent and costume change.

"Who are you?" Deeks asked.

"I was about to ask you the same thing." Williams asked equally bewildered.

"So let me introduce you, Special Agent Sam Hanna, NCIS, meet Detective Marty Deeks, LAPD." Hetty said as she rounded the corner. Suddenly everything fell into place. Jamie did something to service men, the Blood and Guts Warriors were marines. Of course NCIS would be the ones investigating. "Ain't that a kick in the head?"

-/8888

"So what happened to Ryan?" Deeks asked Nate later.

"He didn't pass muster."


End file.
